David Ignatius: Rising tensions in the Pacific

11:09 AM,
Feb. 26, 2014

Written by

David Ignatius

A Chinese military expert is explaining to a conference here what he sees as the benign inevitability of Beijing's rising power in the Pacific. "You should trust China," he says cheerily. "In 10 years, we will be much stronger, and you will feel safer."

This Chinese prediction did not appear to reassure most of the several dozen European and American experts gathered for discussions last weekend. Instead, there was a consensus, even among most of the Chinese participants, that Beijing's growing military power has worried its neighbors and led to friction with Japan, the Philippines and ...